This morning, I got up and left the house, and as soon as I opened the door, there was this little voice at the end of the street, SCREAMING my name! It was Peilo, he is my host cousin. I referred to him earlier as Pietre, but I was wrong, it's Peilo! He is 4 and he is just the cutest thing in the world. I remember Alex always saying about Iraq that kids are the same everywhere. And that statement couldn't be more true. Although I don't always understand him, he just likes to have fun, the other day he came over and was hanging out in my room with his skateboard, he knocked everything off my walls, but he just wanted to hang out. And at the party the other night he was hanging all over me, he is definitely going to be my little buddy! Although I can't speak his language very well, there isn't a kid who doesn't like to be tossed around and stuff, so I think we were able to make a connection!! He has just such a large personality and is so much fun to be around!
So Sunday are elections for mayor in Peru, which I think translates more as the equivalent to
a governor election in the U.S. . Last night my family was watching the debates on T.V. What i found out, is that it is a requirement to vote here, it's not an option, and if you don't vote you will be fined. So people are generally very interested in politics here. Also, Saturday night, the night before the election is a "dry" night, therefore none of the bars or clubs will be open that night because they don't want people drunk going to the polls. I thought this was sort of interesting.
Today we went to a ministry of health center. These are government run facilities that are equivalent to a health department in the U.S. They treat minor illnesses, vaccinate children, treat STI's and work with mother's on breast feeding and stuff. Apparently this was one of the nice ones my language teacher kept telling us. It was relatively clean, but I don't know if it was necessarily sanitary. The U.S. still practice better sanitation, simply by changing the paper in between patients, these exam tables were covered in cloth, and there wasn't a lot of masks, gloves or gowns being used. And since i worked in a hospital I am used to hand sanitizer on every wall and a sink accessible in every room, not the case here. They also, sort of like the US have no consideration for how long, or how sick the patients are in the waiting room, they just take their sweet time.
So tomorrow afternoonn, we are going to the school to work on projects with some kids. They are having us apply the things we will be tackling once we are in site by practicing on the community here. It's kind of cool. Then Friday we are going to Lima to conduct some surveys, and saturday we are supposed to go to Lima for our agricultural training. But apparent'y that is up in the air now because sunday is mayoral elections here which is a huge deal, and one of the major issues is the traffic in Lima, so they are concerned that we will not be able to get in and out of Lima, also since they use schools to vote they are worried it may cause a problem fo us. So we are still waiting on the definitive answer. I will be disappointed it we don't go. I am so excited, it's supposedly beautiful, and very americanized, they have us stores and a starbucks! But it's a long drive, 2 hours each direction. We recently found out that between the months of october and december there are bull fights. So many of us really want to go and see that, except they kill the bull at the end in front of everyone...so i'm not so sure about that, but it's all about the experience and learning the culture.
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